Featherbedridden McNear

U.S. railroads are highballing into a
labor shortage. Selective Service Headquarters last week ranked
railroad labor with coal mining and shipbuilding, urged local draft
boards to give all three categories deferments. The Office of Defense
Transportation said at least 320,000 new railroad workers must be found
by year's end. Retired pensioners are coming back to work.

Yet the terms of most railroad employment still include the
man-and-dollar-wasting practices known as featherbedding. These
intricate Railroad Brotherhood rules, devised when railroad traffic was
shrinking, are aimed at making work and keeping a maximum number...